5G: Can You Hear Me Now?

Ron Wilson, Intel FPGA

The first 5G silicon has been announced. 5G network field trials are underway. The next generation of wireless everything is just about ready. Maybe.

If you listen to other voices, standards groups are still wrestling with important technical issues. Big questions—small cells or large, smart base stations or streamlined ones, centralized computing or distributed—still hang over network development. And the firs “real” 5G might not go live until 2021. So where are we really?

The question is clouded by the existence of several legitimate, but quite different, visions of what 5G really means. For most cellular service subscribers, the term is obvious: just like 3G or 4G, 5G will be an incremental improvement in service. The handset will deliver more consistent service and a more compelling media experience—like 4K UHD video—with imperceptible delays. But ask a network operator, an automotive engineer, or a power engineer, and you may hear very different answers.

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